Pakistan, July 13 -- An effigy of life jacket-wearing migrants and their boat burned atop a huge bonfire in Northern Ireland, a potent example of how the province's deep sectarian divide has fanned and mixed with anti-immigrant hatred.

Researchers pointed to fundamental shifts in the power once wielded by pro-UK Protestant loyalists, who have in recent years echoed some of the right-wing stances heard elsewhere in Europe.

The migrant effigy had been hoisted atop a stories-tall stack of wooden pallets, one of hundreds of pyres lit each year in the run-up to July 12, a historically Protestant celebration.

But many Catholics see the fires and accompanying parades, which celebrate Protestant king William of Orange's victory over his Cathol...